IndiGo Plane Catches Fire on Landing

InterGlobe Aviation Ltd.’s IndiGo — India’s largest budget carrier by market share —had to put out a fire on one of its planes Saturday after its landing gear caught fire after it landed in Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu.

The Airbus A320 flight from Delhi had 176 passengers and six crew members on board, IndiGo said. No one was injured.

The airline said the plane had a “normal landing” in Kathmandu, but after parking, the “ground engineer observed smoke and fire from the right brake assembly” and ordered the emergency evacuation of the passengers and crew.

While IndiGo is still looking into the incident, a person familiar with the investigation said heavy braking on landing may have created sparks and a hydraulic leak on the landing gear which lead to the fire.

The incident is the latest blow to the safety record of Indian carriers. Indian airlines in recent months have experienced a flurry of dangerous and embarrassing incidents.

In January, when fog prevented an Air India Ltd. Airbus A320 from landing in Delhi, the plane with more than 170 people aboard was diverted to Jaipur where, running low on fuel, it touched down next to the runway, blew a tire and damaged its wing.

Last September, an IndiGo Airbus jet skidded on landing at Bangalore airport while landing in heavy rain and damaged some runway lights as well as its landing gear.

India’s aviation-safety ranking has recently been downgraded by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration.

The FAA on Jan. 31 downgraded India’s safety ranking by a notch to Category 2 citing the South Asian country’s persistent shortage of independent and adequately trained inspectors.